Even while pitching with bone spurs in his throwing wrist since the previous September, Slowey still managed to demonstrate why he will be a front-of-the-rotation starter with college-level velocity (88.9-mph fastball in ’09): his outright ownership of the strike zone.

Prior to landing on the DL in July, Slowey was leading the league in first pitch strikes and overall zone presence. This dominance of the space that resides from knees to letters and 17 inches across allowed the Twins righty to keep pace with some of the league’s already elite pitchers. Among those that worked a minimum of 80 innings, Slowey’s 5.00 K/BB ratio was fourth behind Roy Halladay, Dan Haren and Javier Vazquez. The man trailing him is the presumed AL Cy Young in Zack Greinke. Slowey’s rise to the top of that list includes a solid 7.44 K/9 but is magnified by his ultra-stingy issuance of base on balls. Only Joel Pineiro (1.14 BB/9) and Halladay (1.32 BB/9) relinquished fewer free passes than Slowey.

In addition to his command, Slowey refined the use of his changeup in 2009. The results showed more aptitude to getting empty swings – a long-standing criticism of his pitching style:

CHG

Pct Thrown

Vel

WHIFF

Avg

2008

7.8

82.8

.190

2009

9.2

82.7

.270

It was this improvement that provided Slowey with a much needed “out pitch”. On the other hand, Slowey had multiple problems with his slider. The wrist injury may have contributed to the evaporation of his vertical break and the elongation of the horizontal break rendering the pitch much more hittable:

SLD

hBreak

vBreak

WHIFF Avg

2008

1.8

6.1

.227

2009

3.0

4.3

.160

If there are supporters in the clubhouse for keeping a Gomez/Span outfield in 2010, Slowey should be one of the most vocal. As a largely contact-oriented pitcher, nearly 50 percent of balls in play were of the fly ball variety. The rangier outfield would help ensure several more balls find leather rather than turf.

The most important thing to take away from Slowey’s 2009 season is to disregard the 10-wins in 16 starts - it boils down to a product of his ridiculous amount of runs support (5.69 runs per start). Do not attempt to extrapolate that winning percentage over 33 starts in 2010. That would be just wishful thinking. Nevertheless, he is one of the top three starters in the rotation when healthy and could make a run at a 15-win season provided the right mix of defense.

About OtB

"Parker Hageman is the Michael Cuddyer of Twins bloggers -- not the flashiest guy out there, but a solid everyday player. Hageman produces spot-on analysis ... relying on in-depth stats and lots of charts. He takes a sober, performance-based view of players, letting others fall for a player's heart or his leadership skills in the clubhouse. Hageman is one of the four pillars holding up the Star Tribune's TwinsCentric blog."